Zimbabwe’s most wanted: The family of armed robbers

Nhlanhla Moyo, Features Reporter
TWO are wanted by the local police, one is serving a 62-year sentence for armed robbery, all belong to a Christian church, and they are brothers!

They grew up in Mzilikazi, Bulawayo, as offsprings of a very religious but polygamous parentage. From the mid-90s, four members of the Vumbunu family allegedly engaged in all forms of criminal activities including theft, carjacking, stealing from motor vehicles before eventually up scaling their activities to include armed robberies.

Nehemiah Temai Vumbunu is the oldest of this brood of criminal minds and is believed to have stolen thousands of dollars’ worth of cars and property during a crime spree that ended when he was shot along with his suspected armed robbery accomplice, Jabulani Quinton Sibanda.

But before he died seven years ago, the older Vumbunu roped in his younger siblings Elijah, Abraham and Naison also known as Takafa involved, and the trio continued to pull heists well after the death of their mentor.

All three have served time at one point or the other with the duo of Elijah and Abraham now wanted for the alleged role in the recent How Mine robbery during which they got away with 11, 9 kilograms of gold worth US$450 000 and four guns.

And this duo committed one of the country’s biggest heists of all as part of a 13-men team that hit three Cash-In-Transit vehicles carrying the gold to Fidelity.

Only four years ago, Elijah was released from prison on ZW$50 bail pending his appeal against conviction and a 40-year sentence after he and his gang had stormed Mutare Parts in September 2003 and got away with Zimbabwe and United States dollars, collectively valued at $40 million. In 2005, Vumbunu helped to mastermind a prison break at Chikurubi Maximum Prison, where he was confined to the C Hall, which houses rapists, murderers and armed robbers — people convicted of third schedule offences.

Without having been granted bail, Vumbunu was only due to be released in 2026 after completing his jail term.
Elijah’s sibling, Abraham was also recently released from prison where he was serving time for armed robbery. This publication could not establish why or when he was arrested and the reason for his imprisonment.

The third brother, Takafa/Naison is currently serving a 62-year sentence after he was arrested in August of 2015 and was convicted of eight counts of armed robbery and contravening the Firearms and Explosives Act in 2017 along with 11 other members of the gang. The gang of armed robbers that terrorised mines and business premises around the country. The armed robbers were arrested following a spate of heists countrywide using an AK-47 assault rifle, pistols, axes, iron bars and spikes against their victims.

This publication has established that the younger Vumbunu managed to get his sentence reduced by 10 years after successfully saying that he was a first offender.

Like his older brother Elijah, Takafa/Naison and his cohorts were arrested on 4 August, 2015 after they had waylaid two security vehicles transporting about 6,5kg of gold from a mine to Fidelity Printers in Harare.
At the time, our sister publication, The Chronicle reported that the gang proceeded to the mine in four different cars without registration plates.

The court heard that at the time, the gang was armed with six pistols, an AK-47 assault rifle, axes, iron bars and two sets of spikes as they prepared to attack the Safeguard Security company cash-in-transit vehicles.
When the gang was about two kilometres from the mine, they saw the vehicles approaching and threw spikes on the road in a bid to deflate the tyres.

When the victims noticed the spikes and realised they were in danger, they tried to reverse the vehicles, but the gang quickly moved in and deflated the vehicle tyres.

The gang emerged from the right side of the bush, wearing matching blue work suits and face masks and at the same time opening fire on the security vehicles.

As the area was turned into a battlefield, the gang allegedly used axes, hammers and crowbars to smash the front screen and side windows of the armoured vehicle carrying gold, but the crew did not surrender.

The crew reversed safely from the firing zone, while the driver of the escort Toyota Hilux car lost control of the vehicle and rammed into a tree, but the accused (gang) kept randomly firing at the stationary vehicle, while the crew returned fire, resulting in one of the gang members being shot.

The armed robbers realised they had lost, drove away in their getaway truck which they later abandoned about 20 kilometres from the scene, leaving trails of blood on the passenger door. However, during the commission of the offence, some of the gang members were captured by surveillance cameras fitted onto the two armoured vehicles, leading to their positive identification by police.

The blood trail that was left behind was taken for forensic examination and matched one of the suspects, whose wounds were concluded to have been inflicted by a gunshot. Police later pounced on the gang at their hide-out at a 22-roomed farmhouse in Darwendale near Harare.